Worried that you might not find fitting way to mark the 20th anniversary of Cannibal Corpse’s Vile that doesn’t require being, say, devoured by vermin, mummified in barbed wire, or eaten from the inside? Were you hoping to celebrate George “Corpsegrinder” Fisher’s debut via a more metaphorical than naturalistic orgasm through torture?

Well, stop fretting over ignominious ends and consecutive life sentences: Matt Darcy of Nefarious Realm/Nerfherder fame has joined forces with the visionary champions of the weird and transgressive over at Eridanos art gallery and tattoo shop for an exhibit with the Buffalo death metal institution’s fifth full-length as its “bloody, gooey center.”

“Vincent Locke does a tremendous job crafting Cannibal Corpse cover art to reflect the music, but what if you dissected each song and had a different person illustrate their own interpretation?” Darcy replies when Decibel asks for the origin story behind this fine art splatterfest. “The sole guidance I gave each artist was to use the song title and lyrics to their respective track to create an original piece. That’s it. The result is a collection of the most sinister and gruesome art ever fathomed.”

“Disfigured” — Arif Rot

“Cannibal Corpse was the first death metal band I saw live,” Eridanos Gallery Manager Stephanie Crumley adds. “It was 2006 and they had just released Kill. I remember coming to the concert so stoned and being so overwhelmed by the smashing wall of brutality that after a few songs I excused myself to cower in my ride’s car” — an experience, she contends, roughly approximates the impact of the Vile art show: “The songs lend themselves to be the textual inspiration for some visually jarring scenes. To see the hell from the deepest darkest caverns of our mind realized on paper is so ultimately powerful and terrifying.”

It’s ultra provocative stuff and, thus, it comes as no surprise that Darcy and Eridanos are eager to elicit, uh, visceral reactions.

“These songs are plagued with some pretty tough imagery — rats gnawing flesh, self mutilation, maniacal stabbing, genitals being ripped from the body,” Crumley says. “These are the savage visuals that are the ultimate mortal horrors, so to have someone truly connect with these pieces I would imagine the viewer would feel any range of recoil or grotesque.”

“I had joked with the folks at Eridanos that I would love to have someone vomit,” Darcy continues. “Aside from that, I simply hope fans of Cannibal Corpse, death metal, and art enjoy this little idea and can appreciate the pieces being displayed.”

Ten Bazillion Years: The Tony Rettman Interview

Ten Bazillion Years: The Brian Lew Interview

October 12, 2018

Bazillion Points, the heavy metal publishing house founded by Sound of Beast author Ian Christe, turns 10 this year. To celebrate, Decibel has corralled 10 authors from the BP stable to discuss their own works and what it’s like to part of the world’s heaviest publisher. Brian Lew, Murder In The Front Row: Shots From The…